Experimental Approaches in Development and Poverty Alleviation

Abstract

This inaugural World Development Symposium on Development and Poverty Alleviation brings together contributions from a range of disciplines, scholars, practitioners, and countries to mark the recognition of Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer (BDK) through the 2019 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel. Contributors examine how BDK’s work has changed the methods and study of Development Economics, and their extended impact in other social science and interdisciplinary fields. Although experimental evaluation has had a profound impact on the conduct of much research and policy making, further development of RCT approaches, and collaboration across methods and disciplines, and between scholarship and practice, remain crucial to address the most pressing challenges of sustainability and development.

Keywords: experiments, RCT, randomized control trials, field experiment

JEL Classification: A1, O1